The blockbuster video game franchise returns in all its brutal glory with MORTAL KOMBAT II. This time, the fan favorite champions—now joined by Johnny Cage himself—are pitted against one another in the ultimate, no-holds barred, gory battle to defeat the dark rule of Shao Kahn that threatens the very existence of the Earthrealm and its defenders.
Karl Urban stars as Johnny Cage, alongside Adeline Rudolph, Jessica McNamee, Josh Lawson, Ludi Lin, Mehcad Brooks, Tati Gabrielle, Lewis Tan, Damon Herriman, with Chin Han, Tadanobu Asano as Lord Raiden, Joe Taslim as Bi-Han, and Hiroyuki Sanada as Hanzo Hasashi and Scorpion. Director Simon McQuoid returns to helm the follow up to his explosive 2021 cinematic adventure, from a screenplay by Jeremy Slater, based on the videogame created by Ed Boon and John Tobias.
As Mortal Kombat II prepares to smash it’s way into Australian cinemas on May 7, Nick L’Barrow spoke with the film’s director, Simon McQuoid, about utisling IMAX for the sequel and exploring the character journeys through the fight scenes.
Nick: I saw the film in IMAX last night, and the Liu Kang/Kung Lao fight was unbelievable in that format. I’m curious to know what bringing IMAX filmmaking into Mortal Kombat II gave you as a creative?
Simon McQuoid: IMAX came into the process very early. We loved the idea of IMAX. And it was a really enjoyable creative process with [IMAX] in learning and understanding why it is so successful. And they gave guidance on where it works well. I spent a lot of time talking to them. Then cinematographer Steve Windon and I just talked about how to best take on board what IMAX told us, and how do we make it go beyond, “Oh, it’s a bigger screen”, right? So I added these other elements that you would’ve noticed last night, like a certain scene with Baraka. It became a story telling device to help me with that misdirect. That sort of thing was great fun. There’s other little moments where the camera swings around and in the IMAX version, you can see the health bars. It’s just those things that go beyond spectacle and scale.
Nick: Something you have done well in both Mortal Kombat films is make the characters fight the way they feel. I felt like I understood where a character was in their emotional journey by the way they fought. Can you take me through the process of how you capture that mix of emotion and physicality in the fight scenes?
SM: Yeah, well, I guess it starts with the writer, Jeremy Slater, and understanding where each of the characters journeys are within the film. And in this story, we have many characters. Not everyone could have their moment. But once we put all of those character fundamentals in place, it became a matter of talking to Kyle Gardiner, the stunt coordinator, about character and story. About what needs to happen for these characters during these fight scenes. But none of that could have happened unless Jeremy had put the right things in place to begin with. It’s sort of a layering process. It’s like a relay! Jeremy runs the first lap, and then we take the baton and run. But, even through the chaos of what Mortal Kombat is, there needs to be a simplicity and purity in the character’s journeys.
Nick: The iconic Johnny Cage sunglasses are definitely a big part of the film. I was racking my brain the entire movie trying to figure out what that sound effect was you used every time he “unsheathed” his glasses…
SM: Hmm. I actually don’t know! Rob McKenzie, our insanely brilliant, Academy Award winning sound designer, he recorded so much stuff and the sound design in this film is so rich and deep. I always kept saying to Rob, “Give it more mongrel”. Like Kung Lao’s hat, he made that feel so dangerous when it’s bouncing and flying around.
Nick: The practical effects, especially Baraka’s mouth and the costumes, looks incredible. When you have a movie like this that by nature requires lots of visual effects, how exciting is it for you as a filmmaker to be able to still put a strong focus on the practical elements?
SM: Everytime we go to do something in the film, I always approach it with, “How do we do this in camera?” That’s my impulse, and that’s ideally what I would do. How do we make this the most tangible, most real, most connective to an audience? I find when you lean on VFX too much, it turns the audience’s brain off a bit. That’s certainly how I feel. I embrace and love anything I can do in camera. That’s the best way to do it. I would say with Baraka, it’s 95% real prosthetics, then the rest of VFX to just cut out the negative space when he would open his mouth.
Thank you to Simon for his time, and to Warner Bros. for organising the interview. Mortal Kombat II is in Australian cinemas May 7.
